How Corporate Universities Affect Company Financial Results

On January 22,  the results of a study by Peter Parshakov and Elena Shakina on the topic "With or Without CU: A Comparative Study of Efficiency of European and Russian Corporate Universities" were presented

Elena Shakina, head of the IDLab, answered questions from the School of Finance correspondent about the essence of the study.
Why do you think corporate universities have negative or neutral effects for Russian companies?
The fact is that if you look at Russian companies, then there are very few of them. Comparing them with European companies, in reality it is more likely an exception when a Russian company has its own corporate university. But you need to understand that those corporate universities, especially those that are included in the database of our study, are large enough companies such as Sberbank, Rosnano, etc. Accordingly, such projects are usually associated with large investments and serious risks not to pay off in the future. Unfortunately, most often Russian companies do not use the commercial potential of corporate universities, i.e. Usually, such universities act as an internal corporate structure that serves only their needs.
What is the difference between European and Russian corporate universities?
The European experience is much richer, of course, the story is longer there, and they already understand how to return these investments, because it is very difficult to do this only through internal flows. Most European corporate universities sell their services, i.e. they have a very high commercial potential. In other words, corporate universities in Europe are more heterogeneous. There are small companies that are in the class of industry leaders and their projects, respectively, are smaller than in Russia. This allows them to pay faster in the short term.
What can be changed so that the effect becomes positive or is it necessary to change something at all?
Russian companies as leaders should share their accumulated competencies, i.e. trying to implement commercial projects, selling them to their competitors or partners, this is not so important to whom. Thus, part of the investments that were associated with the opening of such a university could be covered not just by an increase in value added, which obviously could well provide a refund, but also by direct flows from the sale of these services. In addition, of course, it is necessary to weigh the costs and benefits, i.e. you need to understand whether you need to open this type of project. And one more thing about which we write in the article is a complementary effect that our universities for some reason do not use. It consists in interaction with classical universities, it is possible to create joint programs that will partially reduce risks through the exchange of experience, as Classical universities have extensive educational experience.
And finally, what are corporate universities complementing or replacing traditional universities with?
This is just the difference between the two markets, i.e. it is obvious that a complementary effect exists in Europe, and in Russia, on the contrary, corporate universities are more likely to compete with traditional universities, which is not very correct from the point of view of the effectiveness of such projects.

(Link to the study: Parshakov P., Shakina E. A. With or without CU: A comparative study of efficiency of European and Russian corporate universities // Journal of Intellectual Capital. 2018. Vol. 19. No. 1. P. 96-111)
Correspondent of the School of Finance Almira Zhadigerova